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Farm your way to victory!

Story of Seasons: Trio of Towns (Bokujō Monogatari: Mittsu no Sato no Taisetsuna Tomodachi, lit. Ranch Story: Cherished Friends of Three Towns in Japan) is a 3DS title as part of the renamed Story of Seasons series of Farm Life Sim games.

The game has your protagonist fulfilling a childhood dream of being a farmer by moving to their uncle's farm. As the title suggests, and similar to Tale of Two Towns, there are three different villages with a distinct flavor to them.

  • Westown: The first town introduced, a mining town full of cows and corrals, based on The Wild West.
  • Lulukoko Village: The second town introduced, a tropical paradise with plenty of oceans and sand.
  • Tsuyukusa: The last town introduced, a traditional oriental village with rice fields.

The player is tasked with raising their prestige with each town and ultimately gaining their father's approval of their dream. Along the way, they'll grow crops, raise adorable pets, become a renowned chef and/ or fashionista, and discover romance with the locals.

The game was released in Japan on June 23, 2016, in America on February 28th, 2017, and in Australia and Europe on October 13th, 2017.


This game contains examples of:

  • Adapted Out: Several major things in the EU version.
    • Like the prior game Story of Seasons (2014), Turtle Stew can't be made in any capacity. Because of this, Komari's best gift was changed from Turtle Stew to Okonomiyaki.
    • Wine can be made, but can't be given as gifts to anyone—so Katsumi's request for Grape Wine to reach Rank A for Tsuyukusa has been changed to mere lemons.
    • The Downloadable Content was never offered in the EU, which removes several extra scenes as well as Woofio and Stephanie as potential love interests and Inari having a child with the player.
  • Aerith and Bob: Names like Wayne, Frank, Miranda, Tatsumi, Hinata, Kasumi compared to Ludus, Zahau, Tigre, Siluka, Lisette...
  • All Animals Are Dogs: Cats and even capybaras are capable of herding livestock just like a dog can.
  • All Deserts Have Cacti: Westown has plenty of cacti, and certain patches of it can be harvested for prickly pears.
  • And Your Reward Is Edible: Played with; recipes and recipe sets are a common prize in competitions.
  • And Your Reward Is Parenthood: Having a child has a few extra requirements in this game compared to others in the franchise, as you have to see certain post-marriage events with your spouse first. (Also, if you marry the implied Kitsune Inari, you need to buy DLC to have their child... whom they magically gift to you.) Your child takes after your spouse, with their hair, eye, and skin color.
  • As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Many of the Lulukoko villagers have vaguely Polynesian-sounding names that don't actually mean anything in any language, or are from a different language entirely (as is the case with Ludus, whose name comes from Latin).
  • Brick Joke: Some of the conversations can include this, in some cases requiring you to talk to the character consecutively over days.
    • After winning a contest, Komari would enthusiastically celebrate the player's victory while chanting Sekihan. Winning another contest in the future can prompt Ginjiro doing the same thing, before the player reveals Komari did it already.
    • Talking to Witchie may make her badmouth her aunt, the Witch Princess, and proudly proclaim that she will surpass her. Talking to her the following day then reveals that she woke up all tied up, possibly her aunt taking her revenge for badmouthing her.
  • Broken Bridge: Lulukoko and Tsuyukusa are both originally inaccessible because of construction on the paths. This is represented by the gates being broken and impassable.
  • But Thou Must!: Certain dialogue options don't really provide much of a choice at all, especially in heart events. Ludus' first love event, for example, forces you to go to him to fix your door...even though, by this point, you should probably have figured out how to replace/repair a door hinge as you've likely been a farmer/construction assistant for a while note .
  • Developer's Foresight: The A Busy Day event involves Daryl visiting a married farmer, sending a letter beforehand about it. If the player married Stephanie or Woofio (both of whom have private ceremonies), Daryl's letter and some of his dialogue changes significantly to acknowledge this. His letter in particular if Woofio is the spouse also has him give a brief description of Woofio's unseen human appearance.
  • Disappeared Dad: Played straight, inverted, and subverted:
    • Played straight with Noel, whose father isn't anywhere to be seen; the reason for this is he and Miranda divorced when Noel was a baby.
    • Inverted with Collin, whose mother isn't anywhere to be seen, but confirmed by Hector to have died from illness when Collin was very young.
    • Inverted and subverted with Komari, who is introduced with just her dad... and quickly mentions that her mother is a world traveler and does this a lot. Dialogue later reveals that it has caused some strife between the two, however.
  • Downloadable Content: Has this for the first time in the series outside of Japan's DLC for Harvest Moon: The Tale of Two Towns (not counting Natsume's original games under the Harvest Moon title). In Japan, it was released as four free updates over the course of 6 months, including new outfits, friend events, two additional marriage candidates and the ability for the PC and Inari to have a child. In the West, however, XSEED announced that after consulting the fandom, they would release it as paid content. This was explained as being due to the sheer amount of text, enough to have encompassed a game in-and-of itself and the costs involved translating said text being the reasons. XSEED even explained why it wasn't included in the game from the get-go: the last update was released right after they entered the QA/submission stage of localization and they knew that either delaying the game to include it or attempting to include it within their original schedule plan were completely out of the question. The DLC pack containing all 4 new content updates was finally given a November 9, 2017 release date for North America, but was never made available in Europe.
  • Empty Levels: Due to the change in the way shipping bonuses from winning harvest festivals works, some crops only give these because of recipes that use one ingredient giving higher value than even certain ones that have won a competition. Since it now only affects your submission instead of all crops of its category, it falls strictly into this.
  • Expy:
    • Inari is similar to Jamie in regards to always being the opposite gender of your player, allowing either gender to woo them. Both characters also can't have children, though an update later allowed Inari to have a child.
    • Though less so than Rachel of Harvest Moon: A New Beginning, the female protagonist looks glaringly like Claire from Harvest Moon: Back to Nature For Girl. They're both blue eyed and their blonde hair is styled similarly.
  • Far East: Tsuyukusa, like with Konohana from Harvest Moon: The Tale of Two Towns.
  • Funetik Aksent: In spades. Westown residents have a very thick Texas drawl with stereotypical words and phrases thrown about, but some Tsuyukusa residents like Ginjiro also have a milder version as a localization choice. The result is that Westown sounds like Hollywood Texas, but Tsuyukusa sounds like actual Texas.
  • Gratuitous Foreign Language: Villagers from Lulukoko tend to pepper their speech with Hawaiian words and phrases.
  • Guest Fighter: Hamtaro is an unlockable pet in the Japanese version. He was removed from the Western release, due to a combination of licensing issues and the series having become very niche in the West.
  • Happily Married: A recurring theme, interesting in that there are many types of happily married couples, ranging from successful arranged marriages where both halves of the couple quietly support each other, to the brawny, kind fisherman head-over-heels for the mildly terrifying love of his life. On a more bittersweet note, there are also quite a few widows and widowers who were once half of a happily married pair.
  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall: One of Ludus' Harvest Festival dialogues has him question how Matsuba is able to decide on a winner when the entries include drastically different crops, wondering if professionals are able to see "some kinda magic invisible number" above the crops, which alludes to the crop
  • Min Maxers Delight: Averted. Choosing the Sportsman starting bonus doesn't let you have 11 stamina hearts, despite starting with one extra, and choosing Miracle with an old file doesn't give you any of them, due to the unlock requirements giving you a total of ten hearts.
  • Mood Whiplash:
    • Some of the picture shows. "Searching for a Star," for example, starts out as an apparently childish (or insipid, depending on your preference) story of a young boy chasing a star around his neighborhood and recounting how very special his family and friends are. Then you're made aware that the star is the boy's father, who's been Dead All Along, and the whole thing is something of an Adventures in Comaland escapade which ends on a bittersweet note with Dad still dead, but the boy informing his mother that she's pregnant and that he will now look after everyone in his father's stead.
    • On a character related usage, Woofio's friend event is about him honing his skills as an animal trainer is as goofy and silly as you'd expect from him. His actual love events on the other hand are more serious in tone, revealing Woofio isn't as carefree and childish as his stage persona implies and he's purposely pushing people away from him because of his Dark Secret.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Wearing the Apron Dress and talking to Haulani has him comment the outfit makes him want to bake a cake. The outfit resembles Elli's, who in her debut game was a baker instead of a nurse.
    • The default outfits from Story of Seasons will prompt a comment by Dessie and Woofio, both of whom debuted in the game. Dessie remarks the outfits as bringing back memories, while Woofio notes they seem familiar.
    • The Safari Ranger and Legendary Cook outfits are the clothes of Agate and Raeger, respectively, from Story of Seasons. The former also has the appropriate hat Agate wore, too.
    • One of Woofio's suggested male baby names is Fritz. Two of his suggested female baby names are Ilse and Agatha, which look similar to Elise and Agate (even more so in the original, as Agatha was originally Agate instead).
  • New Game Plus: Possible by choosing the Miracle starting bonus, which lets you import the majority of everything you unlocked. However, Endgame+ is still in effect, so it doesn't automatically overwrite your old file. You can also invert this by choosing the Weakling starting bonus, which also unlocks after completing the story, and start with nothing carried over and a mere two stamina hearts.
  • Parental Bonus:
    • Ford has a rather suggestive line:
    Though, if you do carry things too far, I may just have to think up some "punishment" for you. That promises to be amusing.
    • In Wayne's final Love Event, he gets offended when you imply that he has a lot of experience having women eating at his house. He has a lot of female admirers but he's never invited any of them over.
  • Personality Powers: Kinda? You can choose a personality type when you create your character and it'll give you a particular starting penalty or bonus. Animal Lover gives bonus friendship with livestock, Fisher lets you catch higher quality fish, Sports Enthusiast starts you off with six stamina hearts instead of five, Tycoon nets you 50000g starting money instead of 4000g, and Charmer grants a friendship bonus with marriage candidates and regular villagers. There's also two you can unlock: Miracle functions as a New Game Plus mode, while Weakling is a Self-Imposed Challenge.
  • Plenty of Blondes: Nearly every single human person in Westown is blond (save Dessie and Stephanie, who have green and pink hair respectively). They range from platinum to strawberry to dirty blond, but they're all a shade of gold. Witchie also has blond hair.
  • Public Bathhouse Scene: In 'A Visit to Tsuyukusa.'
  • Serial Escalation: Unlike Tale of Two Towns, there are now three towns!
  • Shout-Out:
    • Like in the previous title, it makes a nod to Super Mario Bros.. This time you can get Mario's, Luigi's, Toad's, and Peach's clothes for your player to wear. They all even give bonuses!
    • Komari's design is based on Kuon from the River King series.
    • Komari's second Love Event is called The Melancholy of Komari.
    • In one of Ford's friend events, a sick Brad drinks an entire dosage of untested medicine made by the former. The result?
    • MANY of the NPCs in the three villages are shout-outs to famous fictional or real-life figures (such as Lara Croft, Indiana Jones, Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, Wyatt Earp, etc), or cultures, locations, structures, etc (such as Maya, Nazca, and Machu).
    • Woofio's reaction to the Ninja outfit set is to ask if the farmer can throw "spinny things" or run on water before expressing disappointment, saying the road to being a ninja must be hard.
    • One of Woofio's miscellaneous dialogues has him (fittingly) imitate a laugh very reminiscent to Goofy in an attempt to look more friendly.
    • If you have a daughter with Ludus and choose the option to let him pick a name for her, one of the names he suggests is Moana.
  • Someone to Remember Him By: In the picture shows, Noah's mother is pregnant with his little sister after her husband dies.
  • You Mean X Mas: Some of the holidays match up, either date or thematically, with real life holidays.
    • The Festival of Longevity resembles Nanakusa no Sekku.
    • The Star Festival is Tanabata in all but name. Averted in the Japanese version, where it is referred to as that day.
    • Starlight Gala is the same day as Christmas. More obvious after DLC, which adds an event of giving gifts to children.
    • The Pumpkin Festival matches up with Halloween (with pudding replacing candy).
    • Averted with Valentine's Day, which uses the same name.

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